Front Page, June 15, 2016

Front Page

IF IT LOOKS LIKE A DUCK

The waddling, quacking, and very expensively run Lake Geneva Utility Commission was finally recognized for what it is and brought into the ‘family’ fold on Monday night.
The utility ‘duck’ now has a real pond to paddle around in and that pond, and the duck, belong most assuredly to the City of Lake Geneva. Utah Blaine, Lake Geneva’s still new city administrator, spearheaded a movement to rip the department from Piggy Bank Winkler’s grasping fingers, as Winkler goes on into retirement (it’s kind of amazing that Winkler didn’t take over Corleone’s Restaurant for his retirement fulfillment). There’s a bit of a delay in the city’s taking over the utility department because there’s a provision in “Option 2,” as it’s called, that says Winkler must get a six month ‘severance pay’ check and also have his body temperature measured to make sure he’s cold and dead.

Everyone in America usually gets a six months’ salary severance check, you know. So, in order to get rid of Winkler the City of Lake Geneva is extorted out of more than fifty thousand dollars. What’s new, as the good old boys, of which Winkler definitely is one, gouges and slashes his way out of office. It’s quite amazing that the city did not offer to build a Bocce ball court in his back yard, the kind without balls. “Nothing” Kordus, city alderperson, and “Thurston” Howell III, city alderperson, voted against Option 2, but they were overwhelmed by the rest, led of course, by Liz “No guts no glory” Chappell.

The severance pay was voided when Utah eliminated Winkler’s fifty grand gift. He added a provision that excluded the payment, the downside being Piggy Bank staying on until October 1st of 2016. The nuts and bolts of the option voted upon also calls for Dan “The Don” Draper, city attorney and surviving good old boy, to formally write the ordinance, fading Bocce Ball Winkler into the gray mist of his early retirement. G.O.B. Draper is supposed to take the current fiefdom commission and turn it into a city committee, for all intents and purposes. That means, where the current commission has been independent of city council or city administrator oversight and management, it will now be fully in the fold and accountable to both of those leadership entities. This event, should Draper churn out his usual legal Pablum in a timely manner, is a huge gain for transparency, responsibility and money savings for the entire city in every way.

That ‘Nothing’ Kordus and Thurston Howell III voted against the option gives great credibility to the plan’s merits. Alderperson Chappell was rumored to have said “there’s going to be trouble” when Winkler commented on the problems he’d faced from the water department back in 2001, that had never been fixed. Winkler did not mention that he was fired by the water department back then, but appointed to run the utility department as both water and sewer departments were combined under his leadership. Chappell’s comment seems very apropos. There’s going to be trouble in this transition. The good old boys are what they are because they have secrets locked in small closets all over the place.

At some point, after Option 2 becomes effective in October, this new proactive city council (with composting contrast constantly provided by Nothing Kordus and Thurston Howell III) needs to examine the sewer and water provided to the Grand Geneva Resort. It is high time that that place be annexed into Lake Geneva if it is going to continue to receive services from Lake Geneva and use Lake Geneva as its prestigious address

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